A Quote by Oliver Goldsmith

The soul may be compared to a field of battle, where the armies are ready every moment to encounter. Not a single vice but has a more powerful opponent, and not one virtue but may be overborne by a combination of vices.

Oliver Goldsmith

Quote Topics

Armies Battle Combination Compared Encounter Every Field May Moment More More Power Opponent Powerful Ready Single Soul Vice Vices Virtue

Quote Author

Oliver Goldsmith
Irish - Novelist
November 10, 1730 - April 4, 1774

Every moment of existence is a volcano full of truth! Every single moment is ready to explode, may be now, may be two minutes or may be two years later! Truths are ready to erupt! Every single moment is ready to erupt! Be silent; wait for the eruptions!

Mehmet Murat Ildan

May the humanity that is within every human being be held precious. The vice that underlies all vices is that we are held cheap by others, and far worse, that in our innermost soul we think cheaply of ourselves.

Felix Adler

Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Where virtue is, sensibility is the ornament and becoming attire of virtue. On certain occasions it may almost be said to become virtue. But sensibility and all the amiable qualities may likewise become, and too often have become, the panders of vice and the instruments of seduction.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

I may not be funny. I may not be a singer. I may not be a damn seamstress. I may have diabetes. I may have really bad vision. I may have one leg. I may not know how to read. I may not know who the vice president is. I may technically be an alien of the state. I may have a Zune. I may not know Excel. I may be two 9-year-olds in a trench coat. I may not have full control of my bowels. I may drive a '94 Honda Civic. I may not “get” cameras. I may dye my hair with Hydrogen Peroxide. I may be afraid of trees. I may be on fire right now. But I'm a fierce queen.

Justin Johnson

Of all vices take heed of drunkenness; other vices are but fruits of disordered affections--this disorders, nay, banishes reason; other vices but impair the soul--this demolishes her two chief faculties, the understanding and the will; other vices make their own way--this makes way for all vices; he that is a drunkard is qualified for all vice.

Francis Quarles

As every flower fades and as all youth departs, so life at every stage, so every virtue, so our grasp of truth blooms in its day and may not last forever. Since life may summon us at every age, be ready, heart, for parting, new endeavour, be ready bravely and without remorse to find new light that old ties cannot give. In all beginnings dwells a magic force for guarding us and helping us to live.

Hermann Hesse

Others are affected by what I am, and say, and do. So that a single act of mine may spread and spread in widening circles, through a nation or humanity. Through my vice I intensify the taint of vice throughout the universe. Through my misery I make multitudes sad. On the other hand, every development of my virtue makes me an ampler blessing to my race. Every new truth that I gain makes me a brighter light to humanity.

William Ellery Channing

It takes a vice to check a vice, and virtue is the by-product of a stalemate between opposite vices.

Eric Hoffer

The eyes of mankind will be upon you to see whether the Government, which is now more popular than it has been for many years past, will be productive of more virtue moral and political. We may look up to Armies for our Defense, but Virtue is our best Security. It is not possible that any State should long remain free, where Virtue is not supremely honored.

Samuel Adams

?Honoured sir, poverty is not a vice, that's a true saying. Yet I know too that drunkeness is not a virtue, and that's even truer. But beggary, honoured sir, beggary is a vice. In poverty you may still retain your innate nobility of soul, but in beggary--never--no one. For beggary a man is not chased out of human society with a stick, he is swept out with a broom, so as to make it as humiliating as possible; and quite right, too, forasmuch as in beggary as I am ready to be the first to humiliate myself.

Fyodor Dostoevsky

We may look up to Armies for Defence, but Virtue is our best Security. It is not possible that any state should long remain free, where Virtue is not supremely honord.

Samuel Adams

Attachment to a baby is a long-term process, not a single, magical moment. The opportunity for bonding at birth may be compared to falling in love - staying in love takes longer and demands more work.

T. Berry Brazelton

Browns seek knowledge, Blues meddle in causes, and Whites consider the questions of truth with implacable logic. We all do some of it all, of course. But to be Green means to stand ready. In the Trolloc Wars, we were often called the Battle Ajah. All Aes Sedai helped where and when they could, but the Green Ajah alone was always with the armies, in almost every battle. We were the counter to the dreadlords. The Battle Ajah. And now we stand ready, for the Trollocs to come south again, for Tarmon Gai'don. the Last Battle. We will be there. That is what it means to be Green. -Alanna

Robert Jordan

It is not, perhaps, unreasonable to conclude, that a pure and perfect democracy is a thing not attainable by man, constituted as he is of contending elements of vice and virtue, and ever mainly influenced by the predominant principle of self-interest. It may, indeed, be confidently asserted, that there never was that government called a republic, which was not ultimately ruled by a single will, and, therefore, (however bold may seem the paradox,) virtually and substantially a monarchy.